Civil War Civil war was the greatest war in American history. It was waged in 10,000 places-from Valverde, New Mexico, and Fernandina on the Florida coast. More than three million Americans fought in it and more than 600,00 men died in it. It was not only the immensity of the fight but the new weapons, the new standards of generalship, and the strategies of destruction which made the Civil War an event present ever since in the American consciousness. Here are some of the crucial events of the war: the firing of the first shots at Fort Sumter; the battles of Shiloh, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg; Sherman's